To W. D. Fox   23 March [1842]

12 Upper Gower St

March. 23d

My dear Fox.

Your affecting account of the loss of your poor wife1 was forwarded to me yesterday by Susan.— The cessation of her sufferings, which she seems to have borne with such noble, & devoted patience, must be a great relief to all.— I truly sympathise with you, though never in my life, having lost one near relation,2 I daresay I cannot imagine, how severe grief, such as yours, must be, & how little the longest expectation can resign one to the blow, when it falls. Few, I am sure will bear it better than you, although from your most affectionate disposition I cannot fancy anyone feeling it more deeply.— How fortunate Miss Fletcher’s arrival was.3

Your children must be now an infinite comfort to you; I trust they are well & again cheerful, for it is their peculiar blessing to love sweetly & yet not to mourn long.—

—Do write to me, my dear old friend, as soon as you have leisure & some degree of inclination & tell me how you are in health & how your children are— believe me my dear Fox | Your sincere friend | Charles Darwin

1
Harriet Fox died in childbirth on 19 March 1842 (Darwin Pedigree).
2
CD’s mother, Susannah Darwin, died on 15 July 1817 (Darwin Pedigree), when CD was eight years old. In later years he could ‘remember hardly anything about her’ (Autobiography, p. 22). See also Correspondence vol. 2, Appendix III.
3
Harriet Fox’s older sister.

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

1.2 cessation] ‘ce’ over ‘d’
1.4 never] ‘n’ over illeg
1.4 lost] interl
2.2 love] ‘ov’ over ‘on’

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-624,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-624